The Team Science Toolkit: enhancing research collaboration through online knowledge sharing

Bringing Together a Transdisciplinary Team to Create and Advance a Shared Vision for Research and Support for Siblings of Youth With Cancer

Background: Siblings of youth with cancer are at risk for psychosocial difficulties and report unmet needs. Supporting siblings is a psychosocial standard of care; however, many barriers prevent this standard from being fully achieved. Transdisciplinary team science has potential to generate novel, real-world solutions to complex research problems and can be beneficial to addressing sibling needs within pediatric hematology/oncology nursing. This process paper aims to present a guiding framework for transdisciplinary team science using the experiences of the Sibling Partnership for Advocacy, Research, and Care in Childhood Cancer (SPARCCC) as an exemplar. Methods: SPARCCC employed an established model of transdisciplinary team-based research, which consisted of four phases: development, consultation, implementation, and translation. This transdisciplinary team was comprised of international experts from a variety of disciplines, as well as siblings and families impacted by cancer. Results: SPARCCC held two summits, and team members developed ongoing collaborative efforts to advance advocacy, research, and support for siblings of youth with cancer. The team implemented the four phases of the transdisciplinary team-based framework and used an iterative process to build a shared perspective of the needs of siblings and take action. For instance, we completed a grant application, several manuscripts, and conference presentations to disseminate our findings and begin to advance a focused research agenda for sibling supportive care. Discussion: Transdisciplinary team science holds promise for tackling complex issues within pediatric hematology/oncology nursing research, particularly areas that are not well aligned with more traditional models and can be used to generate novel solutions.

Application of community - engaged dissemination and implementation science to improve health equity

Community engagement is critical to accelerate and improve implementation of evidence-based interventions to reduce health inequities. Community-engaged dissemination and implementation research (CEDI) emphasizes engaging stakeholders (e.g., community members, practitioners, community organizations, etc.) with diverse perspectives, experience, and expertise to provide tacit community knowledge regarding the local context, priorities, needs, and assets. Importantly, CEDI can help improve health inequities through incorporating unique perspectives from communities experiencing health inequities that have historically been left out of the research process. The community-engagement process that exists in practice can be highly variable, and characteristics of the process are often underreported, making it difficult to discern how engagement of community partners was used to improve implementation. This paper describes the community-engagement process for a multilevel, pragmatic randomized trial to increase the reach and impact of evidence-based tobacco cessation treatment among Community Health Center patients; describes how engagement activities and the resulting partnership informed the development of implementation strategies and improved the research process; and presents lessons learned to inform future CEDI research.

Curbside Consultation for the Nurse Practitioner: Qualitative Inquiry for Education, Policy, and Practice

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE

Curbside consultation (CC), defined as pursuing information or recommendation regarding patient care, without request for formal consultation is a favored information source for nurse practitioners (NPs) when making clinical decisions in practice settings. Research and education concerning CC among NPs is lacking. The purpose of this study was to obtain an understanding of NP perceptions of interpersonal aspects of the CC process to inform NP clinical practice and education.

METHODS

Qualitative descriptive design and inductive content analysis was used. Twenty primary care and specialty care NP were recruited using purposive sampling for conduct of individual interviews.

RESULTS

Content analysis identified themes describing interpersonal components of the CC process. NP practiced in collaboration with physicians in variable roles within primary care and specialty care settings. These collaborations varied dependent upon supervisory relationships with physicians. Additional themes concerned NP professional experience and characteristics of experts desired for CC. These characteristics included NP perceptions of colleague experience and expertise, trust, and interpersonal relationship dynamics.

IMPLICATIONS FOR PRACTICE

CC processes for NPs are multidimensional, including interpersonal themes as components of this communication exchange. Given CC is a highly utilized resource for NPs, further inquiry is critical for understanding of its implications for NP practice, policy, and education internationally.

On which common ground to build? Transferable knowledge across cases in transdisciplinary sustainability research

To support societal problem solving, transdisciplinary research (TDR) uses knowledge co-production focusing on relevance and validity in a studied case and its particular social-ecological context. In the first instance, the resulting situated knowledge seems to be restricted to these single cases. However, if some of the knowledge generated in TDR could be used in other research projects, this would imply that there is a body of knowledge representing this special type of research. This study used a qualitative approach based on the methodology of grounded theory to empirically examine what knowledge is considered transferable to other cases, if any. 30 leaders of 12 Swiss-based TDR projects in the field of sustainable development were interviewed, representing both academia and practice. The transferable knowledge we found consists of the following: (1) Transdisciplinary principles, (2) transdisciplinary approaches, (3) systematic procedures, (4) product formats, (5) experiential know-how, (6) framings and (7) insights, data and information. The discussion of TDR has predominantly been focusing on transdisciplinary principles and approaches. In order to take knowledge co-production in TDR beyond an unmanageable field of case studies, more efforts in developing and critically discussing transferable knowledge of the other classes are needed, foremost systematic procedures, product formats and framings.

Integrating antibiotic stewardship and infection prevention and control programs using a team science approach

Reduction of health care-associated infections is trending in the right direction after decades of work by those involved in infection prevention and control and antibiotic stewardship. With institutional priorities currently pivoting to meet the needs of COVID-19 patients, this may be an advantageous time to promote integration of facility-level antibiotic stewardship and infection prevention and control programs. We propose a team science framework as a tool to leverage the complementary expertise of stewardship and infection prevention and control professionals. This framework considers stages of team development and fluidity needed when working with shifting priorities and can be used by leaders and team members throughout all phases of team building—from developing and launching the team, through evaluating and modifying team activities to best suit local needs.

Implementing an evidence-based competency model for science team training and evaluation: TeamMAPPS

INTRODUCTION

In response to a call issued by the National Research Council to investigate the knowledge, skills, and attitudes of effective science teams, we designed a team training program for conducting science in collaborative contexts.

METHODS

We reviewed the literature to develop an evidence-based competency model for effective science teams along with exemplary behaviors that can be used for founding team training and evaluation. We discuss the progress of teamwork and team development research that serves as a foundation for this work, as well as previous research involving team-based competencies.

RESULTS

Three overarching competencies emerged from the literature as key for science team effectiveness: psychological safety, awareness and exchange, and self-correction and adaptation. These competencies are fully described, including their evidence base.

CONCLUSIONS

We developed a competency model and implementation plan for a team training program specific to science teams - TeamMAPPS (Team Methods to Advance Processes and Performance in Science). This paper details steps in the implementation process, including plans for consortia dissemination, evaluation, and future development.

Interdisciplinary knowledge combinations and emerging technological topics: Implications for reducing uncertainties in research evaluation

This article puts forth a new indicator of emerging technological topics as a tool for addressing challenges inherent in the evaluation of interdisciplinary research. We present this indicator and test its relationship with interdisciplinary and atypical research combinations. We perform this test by using metadata of scientific publications in three domains with different interdisciplinarity challenges: Nano-Enabled Drug Delivery, Synthetic Biology, and Autonomous Vehicles. Our analysis supports the connection between technological emergence and interdisciplinarity and atypicality in knowledge combinations. We further find that the contributions of interdisciplinary and atypical knowledge combinations to addressing emerging technological topics increase or stay constant over time. Implications for policymakers and contributions to the literature on interdisciplinarity and evaluation are provided.

Transdisciplinary research outcomes based on the Transdisciplinary Research on Energetics and Cancer II initiative experience

Intractable public health problems are influenced by interacting multi-level factors. Dynamic research approaches in which teams of scientists collaborate beyond traditional disciplinary, institutional, and geographic boundaries have emerged as promising strategies to address pressing public health priorities. However, little prior work has identified, defined, and characterized the outcomes of transdisciplinary (TD) research undertaken to address public health problems. Through a mixed methods approach, we identify, define, and characterize TD outcomes and their relevance to improving population health using the Transdisciplinary Research on Energetics and Cancer (TREC) II initiative as a case example. In Phase I, TREC II leadership (n = 10) identified nine initial TD outcomes. In Phase II (web-based survey; n = 23) and Phase III (interviews; n = 26; and focus groups, n = 23) TREC members defined and characterized each outcome. The resulting nine outcomes are described. The nine complementary TD outcomes can be used as a framework to evaluate progress toward impact on complex public health problems. Strategic investment in infrastructure that supports team development and collaboration, such as a coordination center, cross-center working groups, annual funded developmental projects, and face-to-face meetings, may foster achievement of these outcomes. This exploratory work provides a basis for the future investigation and development of quantitative measurement tools to assess the achievement of TD outcomes that are relevant to solving multifactorial public health problems.

Coordinating a new approach to basic research into Parkinson's disease

The Aligning Science Across Parkinson's (ASAP) initiative is building an international network of researchers to improve our understanding of the biology underlying Parkinson's disease. Developing a better understanding of how the disease originates and progresses will, we hope, lead to new therapies. The ASAP initiative will incentivize collaboration between the existing PD research community and other researchers and will be committed to open-science practices.

Online, cross-disciplinary team science training for health and medical professionals: Evaluation of COALESCE (teamscience.net)

INTRODUCTION

The National Academies of Sciences (NAS) emphasize the need for interdisciplinary team science (TS) training, but few training resources are available. COALESCE, an open-access tool developed with National Institutes of Health support and located at teamscience.net, is considered a gold standard resource but has not previously been evaluated. COALESCE launched four learning modules in 2011. The Science of TS (SciTS) module, an interactive encyclopedia, introduces foundational concepts. Three scenario-based modules simulate TS challenges in behavioral, clinical, and basic biomedical sciences. This study examined user characteristics, usage patterns, and effects of completing the four modules on TS knowledge, attitudes, and skills.

METHODS

Repeated measures ANOVA tested for pre-post changes in performance and compared learning by users with biomedical versus other disciplinary backgrounds.

RESULTS

From 2011 through 2017, the site attracted 16,280 new users who engaged in 6461 sessions that lasted more than 1 min. The modal registrant identified as working in a biomedical field (47%), in an academic institution (72%), and expressed greater interest in the practice than the SciTS (67%). Those completing pre- and post-tests (n = 989) showed significant improvement in knowledge, attitudes, and skills after taking all scenario-based modules (p < 0.005); knowledge and attitudes were unchanged after the SciTS encyclopedia. Biomedical and other health professionals improved comparably.

CONCLUSION

Evaluation of the TS training tool at teamscience.net indicates broad dissemination and positive TS-related outcomes. Site upgrades implemented between 2018 and 2020, including adding five new modules, are expected to increase the robustness and accessibility of the COALESCE training resource.

Leadership Roles and Activities Among Alumni Receiving Postdoctoral Fellowship Training in Cancer Prevention

This study was conducted in 2016-2017 to better understand formal and informal leadership roles and activities of alumni from postdoctoral research training programs in cancer prevention. Data were obtained from surveys of 254 employed scientists who completed cancer prevention postdoctoral training within the National Cancer Institute (NCI) Cancer Prevention Fellowship Program, or at US research institutions through NCI-sponsored National Research Service Award (NRSA) individual postdoctoral fellowship (F32) grants, from 1987 to 2011. Fifteen questions categorized under Organizational Leadership, Research Leadership, Professional Society/Conference Leadership, and Broader Scientific/Health Community Leadership domains were analyzed. About 75% of respondents had at least one organizational leadership role or activity during their careers, and 13-34% reported some type of research, professional society/conference, or broader scientific/health community leadership within the past 5 years. Characteristics independently associated with leadership from regression models were being in earlier postdoctoral cohorts (8 items, range for statistically significant ORs = 2.8 to 10.8) and employment sector (8 items, range for statistically significant ORs = 0.4 to 11.7). Scientists whose race/ethnicity was other than white were less likely to report organizational leadership or management responsibilities (OR = 0.4, 95% CI 0.2-0.9). Here, many alumni from NCI-supported cancer prevention postdoctoral programs were involved in leadership, with postdoctoral cohort and employment sector being the factors most often associated with leadership roles and activities. Currently, there is relatively little research on leadership roles of biomedical scientists in general, or in cancer prevention specifically. This study begins to address this gap and provide a basis for more extensive studies of leadership roles and training of scientists.

We've Only Just Begun - Insights from a 25-Year Journey to Accelerate Health Care Transformation Through Delivery System Research

Even though it is well known that quality, safety, and patient-centeredness of health care can be improved, leveraging the organizational apparatus of a care delivery environment to render improvement in a consistent and comprehensive manner has proven difficult. The Health Care Systems Research Network (HCSRN), which began as the HMO Research Network, emerged from a desire to improve health and study problems in health care in a systematic and collaborative way, spurring the delivery of true evidence-informed medicine. The HCSRN has honed network-wide data resources, a collaborative culture, and shared infrastructure, enabling multicenter health care research that is often more difficult for researchers working in less integrated settings and across organizational boundaries. The HCSRN’s 25-year track record confers both an opportunity and obligation to share what we have learned through our research. Considering the quarter-century since the HCSRN was established, we describe three evolving areas—health data, new health care models, and diversified research teams that must be thoughtfully harnessed to realize a transformed health care ecosystem that generates and learns with research.

Leadership Lessons: Developing Mentoring Infrastructure for GEMSSTAR Scholars

Through the National Institute on Aging's (NIA's) "Grants for Early Medical/Surgical Specialists" Transition to Aging Research (GEMSSTAR) U13 grant, the NIA and the American Geriatrics Society (AGS) developed three transdisciplinary research conferences with a focus on mentoring and leadership skills development. The NIA's GEMSSTAR program evolved from two earlier programs, the AGS' Dennis W. Jahnigen and the Association of Specialty Professors' T. Franklin Williams Career Development Scholars Awards. It supports the continued cultivation of the next generation of medical and surgical specialty researchers with an interest in aging research. The award requires both geriatrics and specialty mentoring and currently provides up to $150,000 a year in direct support to scholars. Additionally, the award requires that scholars have a professional development plan that is complementary to the GEMSSTAR award. The U13 conferences, focused on frailty, models of aging, and cognition, brought together GEMSSTAR scholars, former scholars, innovators, mentors, and leaders in aging research, the specialties, and geriatric medicine. This article describes the themes of each of the GEMSSTAR U13 conferences and highlights the lessons learned on mentoring, team science, aging research networks, and work-life balance. We plan to use these lessons to guide the support we provide to the growing group of emerging leaders who are poised to lead the transdisciplinary research network of the future. J Am Geriatr Soc 67:650-656, 2019.

Community-academic partnerships in implementation research

Community-academic partnerships(CAPs) are a critical component of implementing and sustaining evidence-based practices (EBPs) in community settings; however, the approaches used and mechanisms of change within CAPs have not been rigorously studied. The first step to advancing the science of CAP is to operationally define and contextualize the approaches used in CAP as part of the implementation process. Our research group has gleaned valuable lessons about the best ways to develop, support, and nurture community partnerships within the context of implementation. In this article, we share these lessons learned and relate them to implementation strategies that are most relevant to community-partnered implementation endeavors. The implementation strategies most relevant to CAPs are as follows: (a) building a coalition, (b) conducting local consensus discussions, (c) identifying barriers and facilitators to implementation, (d) facilitating interactive problem solving, (e) using an advisory board or workgroup, (f) tailoring strategies, (g) promoting adaptability, and (h) auditing and providing feedback. We offer suggestions for future research to systematically evaluate these strategies, with an eye toward advancing the science of CAP and implementation science and the goal of guiding future research and improving the implementation of EBPs in community settings.

Interdisciplinarity and Adapted Physical Activity

The purpose of the paper was to draw lessons for the field of adapted physical activity from the interrelated literatures on interdisciplinarity, creativity, and team research. In each of these literatures, strategies have been identified that have been found to be useful by previous researchers. Lack of familiarity with these strategies can result in unsuccessful research projects or in the devotion of scarce resources to the reinvention of such strategies. The first section in the paper in particular addresses questions that arose at the 2016 North American Federation of Adapted Physical Activity symposium in Edmonton, Alberta.

Origins of Cancer Disparities in Young Adults: Logic Models to Guide Research

Cancer disparities research is motivated by persistent inequities in cancer outcomes by race, ethnicity, social status, neighborhood location, and other subpopulation characteristics. These inequities have proven to be persistent and difficult to alter. Part of the reason for the frustration with slow progress is a lack of appreciation of the long-term nature of the undertaking. It is highly likely that the disparities observed in adulthood find their origins in young adulthood, if not earlier. A long-term perspective is needed, recognizing that successes may take many years to realize. This commentary presents the experience of the Center for Health And Risk in Minority youth and young adults project, which is a comprehensive center of excellence funded by the National Institute of Minority Health and Health Disparities for addressing disparities and chronic disease prevention in minority youth and young adults. The use of logic models is advanced for this kind of research because they can provide a theory of change and illustrate the course of knowledge translation over time. Logic models for cancer disparities research can place individual project activities in a realistic context that at one time indicates what is possible and reasonable to expect during the duration of a typical research project as well as the future steps that need to be taken on the way to an expected ultimate impact on cancer inequities.

Strategies for mHealth research: lessons from 3 mobile intervention studies

The capacity of Mobile Health (mHealth) technologies to propel healthcare forward is directly linked to the quality of mobile interventions developed through careful mHealth research. mHealth research entails several unique characteristics, including collaboration with technologists at all phases of a project, reliance on regional telecommunication infrastructure and commercial mobile service providers, and deployment and evaluation of interventions "in the wild", with participants using mobile tools in uncontrolled environments. In the current paper, we summarize the lessons our multi-institutional/multi-disciplinary team has learned conducting a range of mHealth projects using mobile phones with diverse clinical populations. First, we describe three ongoing projects that we draw from to illustrate throughout the paper. We then provide an example for multidisciplinary teamwork and conceptual mHealth intervention development that we found to be particularly useful. Finally, we discuss mHealth research challenges (i.e. evolving technology, mobile phone selection, user characteristics, the deployment environment, and mHealth system "bugs and glitches"), and provide recommendations for identifying and resolving barriers, or preventing their occurrence altogether.

Perceived discontinuities and continuities in transdisciplinary scientific working groups

We examine the DataONE (Data Observation Network for Earth) project, a transdisciplinary organization tasked with creating a cyberinfrastructure platform to ensure preservation of and access to environmental science and biological science data. Its objective was a difficult one to achieve, requiring innovative solutions. The DataONE project used a working group structure to organize its members. We use organizational discontinuity theory as our lens to understand the factors associated with success in such projects. Based on quantitative and qualitative data collected from DataONE members, we offer recommendations for the use of working groups in transdisciplinary synthesis. Recommendations include welcome diverse opinions and world views, establish shared communication practices, schedule periodic synchronous face-to-face meetings, and ensure the active participation of bridge builders or knowledge brokers such as librarians who know how to ask questions about disciplines not their own.

The next generation of large-scale epidemiologic research: implications for training cancer epidemiologists

There is expanding consensus on the need to modernize the training of cancer epidemiologists to accommodate rapidly emerging technological advancements and the digital age, which are transforming the practice of cancer epidemiology. There is also a growing imperative to extend cancer epidemiology research that is etiological to that which is applied and has the potential to affect individual and public health. Medical schools and schools of public health are recognizing the need to develop such integrated programs; however, we lack the data to estimate how many current training programs are effectively equipping epidemiology students with the knowledge and tools to design, conduct, and analyze these increasingly complex studies. There is also a need to develop new mentoring approaches to account for the transdisciplinary team-science environment that now prevails. With increased dialogue among schools of public health, medical schools, and cancer centers, revised competencies and training programs at predoctoral, doctoral, and postdoctoral levels must be developed. Continuous collection of data on the impact and outcomes of such programs is also recommended.

Realizing the Promise of Social Psychology in Improving Public Health

The theories, phenomena, empirical findings, and methodological approaches that characterize contemporary social psychology hold much promise for addressing enduring problems in public health. Indeed, social psychologists played a major role in the development of the discipline of health psychology during the 1970s and 1980s. The health domain allows for the testing, refinement, and application of many interesting and important research questions in social psychology, and offers the discipline a chance to enhance its reach and visibility. Nevertheless, in a review of recent articles in two major social-psychological journals ( Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin and Journal of Personality and Social Psychology), we found that only 3.2% of 467 studies explored health-related topics. In this article, we identify opportunities for research at the interface of social psychology and health, delineate barriers, and offer strategies that can address these barriers as the discipline continues to evolve.